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Winners of NASA design contest announced
WASHINGTON
(UPI) -- A rescue vehicle designed by 10 Virginia Tech students has won the top prize in a NASA competition for college students to design a multipurpose aircraft.
The space agency said the rotorcraft, which resembles a catamaran, met the competition's challenge to design a civilian aircraft that could rescue up to 50 survivors in the event of a natural disaster, hover to help rescue missions, land on ground or water, travel 920 miles and cruise at speeds up to 345 miles an hour.
The amphibious tilt-rotor vehicle also had to be able to fight fires by siphoning water into an internal tank, then dumping it after becoming airborne, NASA officials said.
More than 100 college students from the United States, India, the United Kingdom, Canada, Poland, China and Nigeria entered the contest in teams or as individuals.
A team of 10 graduate students from Georgia Tech in Atlanta and the University of Liverpool in England took second place, and 28 undergraduates from the University of Virginia placed third.
Each winning U.S. team received a cash award and an engraved trophy. Cash awards ranged from $5,000 for first place to $3,000 for third place. Five of the students from the top U.S. teams also won paid summer internships at NASA.
WASHINGTON
(UPI) -- A rescue vehicle designed by 10 Virginia Tech students has won the top prize in a NASA competition for college students to design a multipurpose aircraft.
The space agency said the rotorcraft, which resembles a catamaran, met the competition's challenge to design a civilian aircraft that could rescue up to 50 survivors in the event of a natural disaster, hover to help rescue missions, land on ground or water, travel 920 miles and cruise at speeds up to 345 miles an hour.
The amphibious tilt-rotor vehicle also had to be able to fight fires by siphoning water into an internal tank, then dumping it after becoming airborne, NASA officials said.
More than 100 college students from the United States, India, the United Kingdom, Canada, Poland, China and Nigeria entered the contest in teams or as individuals.
A team of 10 graduate students from Georgia Tech in Atlanta and the University of Liverpool in England took second place, and 28 undergraduates from the University of Virginia placed third.
Each winning U.S. team received a cash award and an engraved trophy. Cash awards ranged from $5,000 for first place to $3,000 for third place. Five of the students from the top U.S. teams also won paid summer internships at NASA.